Koroksun

Koroksun is a Slavic holiday similar to Halloween Fact|date=October 2008as a day when the Black God and other evil spirits are most potent. It was celebrated by pagan Slavs on the longest night of the year, i.e., the night of the winter solstice (December 21).Fact|date=October 2008

On this night, Hors, symbolising old sun, becomes smaller as the days become shorter in the Northern Hemisphere, and dies on December 22nd, the winter solstice. It is said to be defeated by the dark and evil powers of the Black God. On December 23rd Hors is resurrected and becomes the new sun, Koleda.

Most scholars have derived this word from the Romanian "crăciún" for Christmas , but a recently discovered Novgorodian manuscriptFact|date=October 2008 makes the Slavic origin more probableSyn|date=October 2008Fact|date=October 2008. Max Vasmer derived the word from the Common Slavonic for "to step forward". In this case, Koroksun may be translated as "the day which connects the old year with the new one". It is opposed to the summer solstice holiday, Ivan Kupala Day.

Modern scholars tend to associate this holiday with the ancestor worship. On this day Western Slavs lit fires at cemeteries to keep their loved ones warm, and organized feasts to honour the dead and keep them fed. They also lit wooden logs at local crossroads. In some Slavic languages, the word came to denote unexpected death of a young person and the evil spirit that shortens life.

Ironically, the non-Slavic Hungarian language took over the word from its neighbouring Slavic people along with Christianity, and now "Karácsony" means ChristmasSyn|date=October 2008. The word never had the above original meaning, as the Magyars had a non-Indoeuropean mythology.

A few Hungarian historians have tried to falsify the origin of the word, claiming that it in fact comes from the Slavic “koroksun”, and attribute the Romanian word’s origin to Bulgarians. However, the reason for replacing “o” with “a” is never explained, and no other example of such a replacement is noticeable in any Hungarian word of Slavic origin. Secondly, the “ks” phoneme in Slavic languages, results in a “kuhhss” sound completely different from the “cs” in Hungarian which sounds like “ch”. The fact is that the word “koroksun” was actually not even used at the time of the Christianization of the Magyars. In its stead, the Slavs used the words Koleda for Christmas, which today is still preserved in Bulgarian and Macedonian. Therefore, it is impossible for the Romanians to get a word like “Craciun” from “Koleda”, and the Bulgarian origin of the word is proven false. More importantly, the word koroksun is not used by any contemporary Slavs, and was likely never used at all, being a mere invention, a stipulation by Magyar historians as to what a Slavic corruption of Karacsony might sound like and to prove the origin of the word is not the Romanian "Craciun". [Dovezi de Ordin Lingvistic ale Continuitatii Poporului Roman in Mileniul 1 al Erei Noastre" de Virgiliu Stefanescu-Draganesti, p. 49]

Notes

ee also

*Winter solstice
*Koleda